Immersive, Collaborative Simulations and Neomillennial Learning Styles: Implications for Education and Training

Chris Dede

Harvard University

Friday, February 1^st, 2008
11:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
Fuller Labs 320

Emerging interactive media are shaping users' motivations, attributes, and social patterns into types of learning styles quite different than those based on sensory, personality, or intelligence factors. "Neomillennial" learners seek educational situations that interweave face-to-face interactions with shared virtual experiences across distance and time (distributed-learning). This session will demonstrate examples of game-like, immersive, collaborative simulations and will discuss implications of neomillennial learning styles for education and training.

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Chris Dede is the Timothy E. Wirth Professor in Learning Technologies at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education. His fields of scholarship include emerging technologies, policy, and leadership. His funded research includes a grant from the National Science Foundation to aid middle school students learning science via shared virtual environments and a Star Schools grant from the U.S. Department of Education to help high school students with math and literacy skills using wireless mobile devices to create augmented reality simulations. In 2007, he was honored by Harvard University as an outstanding teacher. Chris has served as a member of the National Academy of Sciences Committee on Foundations of Educational and Psychological Assessment, a member of the U.S. Department of Education’s Expert Panel on Technology, and International Steering Committee member for the Second International Technology in Education Study. He serves on Advisory Boards and Commissions for PBS TeacherLine, the Partnership for 21^st Century Skills, the Pittsburgh Science of Learning Center, and several federal research grants. In addition, Chris is a member of the Board of Directors of the Boston Tech Academy, an experimental small high school in the Boston Public School system, funded by the Gates Foundation. His co-edited book, Scaling Up Success: Lessons Learned from Technology-based Educational Improvement, was published by Jossey-Bass in 2005. A second volume he edited, Online Professional Development for Teachers: Emerging Models and Methods, was published by the Harvard Education Press in 2006.

Host: Janice Gobert

Refreshments will be served.

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Last modified: Feb. 01.2008